Look up Henry George and the Single Tax: the tax on economic rents. Land ownership, intellectual property, and so on are taxed. This was pitched as an alternat

Look up Henry George and the Single Tax: the tax on economic rents. Land ownership, intellectual property, and so on are taxed. This was pitched as an alternative to income taxes, which deincentivie labor and reduce income and thus the ability for people to be self-reliant instead of dependent on charity or government programs, and sales taxes, which fall disproportionately on poorer people who have to spend a larger share of their income on basic needs. Even Milton Friedman, no friend of taxes, thought if George’s Single Tax proposal as “the least worst tax,” because it would (theoretically) have the least depressing effect on economic growth. Theoretically, your landlord could not raise rents to avoid their tax burden, as the increase in rent would directly correlate with their tax burden. George also suggested that Single Tax revenues could provide for a UBI, although the size and scope of government was much smaller in 1880. Speaking as a junior white-collar worker whose only significant capital is held in a retirement account, the idea of a tax on economic rents (and an assumed cut in my income/payroll/sales taxes) is very appealing, far more than a paltry UBI check each month.